It’s been a busy year for universities. They’ve discovered a new planet, brought about changes in the law that will protect the rights of the deaf community and transformed the care given to stroke patients. They’ve even spread a love of geology by using a seismometer to measure the roaring explosions of victorious Leicester City fans (otherwise known as a Vardy Quake).

The Guardian University Awards 2017 showcases some of the great work carried out by UK universities. This year, we saw a huge number of submissions demonstrating social and community projects – the second most popular category for entries behind student experience. Universities told us about their innovative volunteering programmes, as well as the outreach work they’re doing to make the arts and sciences accessible to local people.

There was also a big leap in the number of universities celebrating the work they are doing to advance staff equality – a positive sign for a sector that is, like many, severely lacking in diversity at leadership level.

The Guardian’s universities editor, Judy Friedberg, said the awards ceremony, presented by Lauren Laverne on Wednesday night, was a chance to celebrate brilliance at universities.

Friedberg called the awards “the Untef”, referring to the government’s new teaching excellence framework (Tef), which will rank universities according to teaching quality when it is released later in the spring.

“By early June, we’re going to have the results of the teaching excellence framework and we’ll know exactly who has been allocated gold, silver and bronze ratings. While the Tef pits university against university, I like to think of our awards as the Untef.

“We don’t judge all universities by the same clunky metrics. We look for examples of brilliance in all types of universities – and then we trumpet those successes to Guardian readers around the world.

“Do we think a success story is any less important because it took place in ‘bronze’ university? On the contrary. We think that’s something the entire sector should applaud,” she said.

So which universities were recognised at the awards event? Here’s our list of the winners and runners up.

Advancing staff equality

Winner: University of Wolverhampton

Runners up: University of Essex and University of Greenwich

Buildings that inspire

Winner: Nottingham Trent University

Runners up: University of Essex and Cardiff University

Business partnership

Winner: The Open University

Runners up: Newcastle University and Swansea University

Digital innovation

Winner: University of Central Lancashire

Runners up: University of Leeds and Leeds College of Art, and The Open University

Employability initiative

Winner: University of Nottingham, School of Veterinary Medicine and Science

Runners up: Henley Business School and University of Liverpool

Entrepreneurship

Supported by National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education

Winner: Falmouth University

Runners up: University of Greenwich and University of Southampton

International projects

Winner: The Open University

Runners up: The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and Fevered Sleep, and University of Nottingham

Marketing and communications campaign

Supported by Net Natives

Winner: University of Sheffield

Runners up: University of Leicester and Nottingham Trent University

Research impact

Supported by Emerald Publishing

Winner: Queen Mary University of London

Runners up: Heriot-Watt University and Coventry University

Social and community impact

Winner: Heriot-Watt University

Runners up: The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and De Montfort University

Student diversity and widening participation

Supported by Net Natives

Winner: University of East London

Runners up: De Montfort University and University of Sunderland

Student experience

Winner: Imperial College London

Runners up: Newcastle University Students’ Union and Nottingham Trent University